I’m a 3L looking to pick classes for next spring. I am looking to take the CA bar and have taken the relatively more important bar classes such as Evidence, Crim Pro, and BA. I have 2 more credits to pick, and am trying to decide between Pretrial Advocacy and Secured Transaction.

I could elect to do either with Pass/Fail. The final for the former would be a paper. The class essentially covers anything leading up to a trial, which I think is interesting and could be helpful for practice. Secured Transaction’s final would be an exam. I am interested in commercial law in general so this class also looks good, and I heard it covers UCC article 9, which will be on the bar.

Any thoughts as to which one I should select? I think Pretrial Ad seems like a fun class and I could learn more, but Secured Transaction is on the bar, and I also like commercial law in general. Would appreciate any advices

I wouldn't take a class just because it's on the bar--the bar course you take will boil down the main principles that you need pretty well. I would take a "bar" course if it's relevant to what you want to do. I think pretrial advocacy pass/fail could be a lot of fun and you could also pick up some practice skills that could come in handy someday. You never know.

Last edited by NoDayButToday on Fri Jan 26, 2018 11:03 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Take what you want. You'll learn what you need to know for the bar when studying for the bar. I personally would take whatever you found to be more interesting/ whatever gave you a better schedule.

You may remember what you learned in class while studying for the bar if you took a bar specific course, but remember that what you learned was based on the professor's interpretation of the law, not the bar examiners (some professors have different views about the law).

A disclaimer: Although if you take a paper class you don't have to worry about a final, the paper may end up costing you more time to write than studying and taking an in class final.

Take Secured. It was on my most recent bar (FL) and the only reason I could put together a decent essay was because I thought back to what I learned in law school. I could barely remember anything for Secured during my bar prep (because they covered it very briefly).

It may not be fun, but there's a huge pay off.

But pretrial would be great, too. I had a lot of friends in law school who took it (I took Alternative Dispute Resolution instead) and they only had great things to say about it (although they had to do a lot of work). It was a more practical course, something that you can always benefit from (contrasted to something like Property...where you learn it for the bar and never hear from it again).

Highly recommend you choose courses that are tested on the bar exam. In an ideal situation I wouldn't have to recommend this, but the fact is that trying to learn a subject for the bar exam rather than merely reviewing what you've learned from taking it in law school is really difficult. Ultimately passing the exam is so important so take the courses that are tested.